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Thanks for checking us out. We will be posting pics from our sessions for people to keep up with. Here is a little info on what were all about:

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What is Training Ground?

Training Ground is a Christ-centered, experiential discipleship program located in Colorado Springs, Colorado for young men ages 18-25. We invite 8-10 young men, through our application process, to explore and discover testing, trials, and reflection in work, wilderness, and worship, all through a community of older men and guides.

Experiential Discipleship: What does it look like?

Jesus spent three years with twelve men. He lived with them. Shared meals. And invited them into the Heavenly Father's heart and the Kingdom of God. They didn't sit at Starbucks for a one hour meeting, and bible study. While the Pharisees sat collecting knowledge, Jesus took them out--into wilderness, into communities, and into relationships to interact and learn. Ultimately, growing their faith and understanding of Scripture.

The information age, with technology has given us facts at our fingertips, and instant access to knowledge by "googling it." Our educational learning has been confined to classroom instruction from a chalkboard, four walls, and mostly female teachers.

We don't even understand the true form of discipleship anymore.

Jesus taught by interactive, and experiential teaching. It was not about memorization, or getting it "right," and making the A. It was experience based learning, much of which the disciples failed at first. The disciples made mistakes and screwed up. But Jesus knew this. It was how they were learning. Through these hands-on contexts,he grew their faith, not by contemplating ideas, but by engaging them with their people, and with physical things, like loaves, and trees, and storms. He took God's word into their midst. And taught them by being with them through life.

Training Ground believes that you will learn not by memorization, but by being taken into people, places, and even your own story, where Jesus words about the Kingdom of God and the Spirit our at work. We teach formally, and informally. And we believe that to learn the deep things of God, true discipleship is required.

Leadership Training: How does it work?

The path of the world is up. Success is about achievement. Getting the hookup, the connection that moves you forward, and helps you rise to the top. We are a world of self-seekers looking for the shortcut to success.

But Jesus path, started with the way down. Training as a carpenter under Joseph. He worked-hard. There were no shortcuts. He chose the path of suffering, pain, sweat, powerlessness, and endured the cross because of his understanding of what leadership contains. Love of others-and service to a greater cause, his being our resurrection, and new life.

Leadership must include the way down. Baptism is a descent so that we can be re-born. It must start at the lowest position, in a job, and in humility in teaching, and brokenness, and understanding our own story, and the hurt and pain of this world. Until we wrestle, and find God there, maybe even our own tears, we can be of no use to others anywhere above that.

What do you find in most young men? They are ready to rise. We believe there is a great pride in most young men because they are never taken into humility, and a deeper understanding of the fall, and their own life. We believe to become a great leader, you need to wrestle with some deep things of God.

At Training Ground, our mission is to grow men of character and heart who will impact their community, their family, and the next generation to come. While our mission is to grow leaders, we take young men into their story, their pain, and hurt, their family story, and through real life experiences both in work, and in wilderness to explore who they are, and so Christ can set them free.

Male Initiation: What does it look like?

A boy does not just become a man, because he grows older. He is made into one. Masculinity bestows masculinity. A father is to lead his son. And other men are to come along as well. This requires a process, stages, and steps, marked by testing, trials, failures, breakthroughs, and a community of men around to be lead into his masculine identity as a man, made in God's image. Even Jesus said, "the Son can do nothing by himself, he can do only what he sees his Father doing."

It is a spiritual idea. Father and son. While it never went perfect, boys were around their fathers because of work. A son might have worked in his father's shop, or on the farm next to him. Or took an apprenticeship for a blacksmith, or a carpenter, where he spent thousands of hours around men. Even Jesus lived this model taking on Joseph's profession as a carpenter. For most of the history of humankind, boys learned by their father's instruction, not through purely academic institutions.

But with the industrial revolution, things changed. That process has been stripped away. Fathers are absent. Men are no longer leading their sons into spiritual maturity, and guidance through hands on experiences, and teaching. Men are commuting miles from their home, and boys often rarely see their fathers because of it. And rarely is masculinity passed on.

At Training Ground, we invite a community of men and guides to teach the young men through hands on experiences. From their time working, to the weekends fly-fishing, or hunting, even personal finance. It all comes through the hands-on instruction of older men. We engage young men back into this process. Of learning how to watch, and learn first, then through the men's insight, instruction, and guidance, step into this process on their own. And teach him to ask for what he needs.


For more information please visit our website trainingground.com/